It should go without saying that the quirkiness of the Ora 07 extends beyond its interesting exterior design.
Now ordinarily, every Automacha review ends with a small Odds & Ends section that detail a few quirks of the car tested.
Upon buttoning up the review for the GWM Ora 07 Long Range Ultra however, it was discovered that there were more than just a few little points of note with this rather quirky car. In fact, it came to the point that what typically was small section somehow ballooned to somehow become nearly as long as the review itself.
So here it is then in a separate article, all the many interesting (both good and bad!) things discovered after living with a GWM Ora 07 Long Range Ultra for a few days:
1. The Ora 07’s air conditioning has a swing function for its vents. The downside to having motorised air-con vents however is that the vents can’t be adjusted physically, and in the case of the Ora 07 can only be done so through the central screen. What more is that the adjustment through the screen is really not fine enough to easily direct it to blow air exactly where one really desires, which is especially frustrating when stepping into the car from the sweltering Malaysian heat.
2. There is no physical volume knob or toggle on the central stack for the passenger to adjust the audio volume with, and the only way to adjust the volume (bar the steering wheel buttons) is to swipe down from the top of the central screen. This method of swiping down however doesn’t seem to work when Android Auto is running on the central screen.
3. Interestingly for such a new car, the Ora 07 still features USB Type A ports up front.
4. The Ora 07 has a speed-based automatic window closing feature that is configurable on the central screen, which certainly incentivises just booting the accelerator when exiting from a Touch n Go toll gate.
5. The Ora 07 has a fun simulated sound wave feature that offers a selection of synthesised engine noises to make this EV sound like an ICE car, with a wide variety of engine options to choose from as well. It is however not the most synchronised with the throttle application.
6. The keyless unlock/lock button on the Ora 07 is only available on the driver’s door, like most Chinese cars. But what is unique here with the Ora 07 is that the button lies on the edge of the flick-out door handle, which does make it a somewhat precarious press when trying to lock the car.
7. While the surround view camera of the Ora 07 has a decently high resolution feed, the overall view is quite fish-eyed. The camera system does redeem itself somewhat by offering feeds down both sides of the vehicle, thereby making manoeuvring around tight corners in this large car just that little bit easier.
8. The Ora 07’s intelligent self-parking feature works surprisingly well. It does activate the hazards when doing so though, which does make everyone else in the car park take notice and possibly question why the driver would put the hazards on for a simple parking manoeuvre.
9. There is a thin red bar below the current song choice display in the left-most digital instrument screen showing how far into the song it is at any given moment. Another neat touch on the digital instrument cluster is for the little Ora 07 icon will also be flashing its indicators when the turn signals are activated.
10. In an attempt to minimise button count while offering configurability of its left digital instrument binnacle, there is a ‘switch menu’ button to toggle what the buttons on the left of the steering wheel do: switch between various display menus or adjust audio settings. A clever idea in theory, but in practice it requires the driver to pay attention to whether a little green icon is not on before making any changes to the volume or track, else what changes instead will be the menu display. Also, it is not possible to change track or volume from the steering wheel controls when the 360º camera is activated.
11. There is a shortcut button on the Ora 07’s steering wheel, but it only has five selectable configurations: phone, 360° surround view, intelligent parking, A/C auto mode and favourite (radio) stations.
12. The Ora 07 comes as standard with some pretty luxurious thick pile faux fur floor mats, with it even extending all the way to the dead pedal for that extra premium touch.
13. The Ora 07 suffers from the same Honda LaneWatch gripe of the blind spot camera feed replacing the map view on the central screen when the indicator is activated, which does make for making turns into unfamiliar streets that little bit more nerve-wracking. What more is that unlike Honda’s LaneWatch that has an easy physical override on the indicator stalk, the Ora 07 requires the not-so-easy-to-do-while-driving tap on the screen to cancel.
There is nevertheless direction arrows displayed on both the instrument cluster and heads up display to alleviate this issue somewhat, with both these showing up even when connected to Google Maps or Waze via Android Auto. Though do note that the arrow icons shown on the instrument cluster and heads up display are just generic directions, with it not showing exact U-turn directions or roundabout exits for example (as shown in the picture below).
14. The locking tone on the Ora 07 is not your standard alarm beep, but like the startup sound to a Windows computer instead.
15. The front seat of the Ora 07 can’t be adjusted when the car is in motion.
16. Activating the cruise control on the Ora 07 is by pressing down on the gear lever after the vehicle is in D.
17. The turbine-style circular air-vents featured right behind the front armrest of the Ora 07 looks to be lifted straight out of a Mercedes-Benz.
18. While significantly better than its other Chinese counterparts, there is still a bit of interesting grammatical choices with the infotainment UI for the Ora 07, like the term ‘front pass’ in the zone display settings for instance.
19. The start up animation of the Ora 07 shows an affectionate interaction between a fish and cat, which ends with a soft-sounding cat meow for that added touch of whimsy. And no, there is no way (as far as this writer can tell) of disabling it.
20. There is no frunk in the Ora 07, owing to it having its sole drive motor up front. It does nevertheless have quite a large boot.
21. While other cars have things like sports mode, the Ora 07 has something it calls WELL BEING mode.
